Morning Routine
by Luddles
Summary: A peek into the daily lives of the SOLDIER First Class, particularly what they do in the morning. Involves Genesis in a bathrobe, Angeal making breakfast, and Sephiroth towel-whipping people. Pre-CC. Oneshot.


**Morning Routine**

**A/N: **Just writing this for the heck of it, and because I was theorizing. I honestly feel like I might have written something almost identical to this before, but who knows?

Sephiroth had never used an alarm clock in his life. He didn't really need one, so long as he didn't need to be up before the appointed time he woke every morning: exactly 5:30 A.M. Genesis didn't know how he did it, but the general was always up before the break of dawn. He threw on a shirt and went for a run every morning, got back by 5:45, and took a fifteen-minute shower. By the time he was out, Angeal's alarm clock was screaming.

Sephiroth leaned over and hit the snooze on the alarm, because Angeal, although he was woken up by it, wouldn't turn it off. Angeal never quite wanted to move in the mornings. "Wake up," Sephiroth ordered Angeal, tugging the blankets off the dark-haired man. That was about all it took to get Angeal to wake up and start wandering to the bathroom to shower. Sephiroth followed him in once the curtain was closed so that he could shave and dry his hair. That took an age and a half, and if Sephiroth didn't have time, he just wouldn't take a shower. His hair weighed about ten pounds when it was wet, after all.

Angeal got out of the shower while Sephiroth was fighting the daily battle with his hair. They were used to changing around each other. After the phase of being Third Class and having to share a communal shower with twenty other men, it was kind of a relief only living with the three of them.

Genesis was still laying in bed by this point. The redhead was never very good with the whole morning thing. Angeal tried gently to wake him up, rubbing his shoulders and saying very quietly that it was time to wake up. Sephiroth rolled his eyes like he did every morning, walked into the bedroom and towel-whipped Genesis as hard as he could. There was always some garbled curses and more colorful recitations of Loveless at that kind of behavior.

"You won't wake up to anything else," Sephiroth argued, forcibly shoving Genesis into the bathroom.

Some mornings, Genesis wandered into the shower blearily and went about his morning routine like he was supposed to. Other mornings, Genesis decided the bath mat was just as nice a place to sleep as his bed, even though it was a little damp. On those sorts of days, Sephiroth or Angeal forcibly put Genesis in the shower, turned the water on as cold as it would go, and let him get soaked.

Genesis had long since stopped wearing pajamas.

While Genesis struggled to stay awake in the shower (he had learned not to fall asleep after the time he almost drowned once), Angeal made breakfast and Sephiroth read. None of them put their uniforms on until they were almost ready to leave, so mornings were usually an event of Sephiroth in plain black pajama bottoms, Angeal in his boxers and a T-shirt, and Genesis in only his underwear, but curled up inside the most enormous, fluffy bathrobe Midgar had ever known.

It was usually the smell of coffee that dragged a bathrobe-clad, wet-haired Genesis from the bathroom. He slumped into a kitchen chair just as Angeal placed the enormous crimson mug that was always Genesis's on the kitchen table. Genesis never ate breakfast. It was only as much coffee as he could fit in the mug for him. Sephiroth and Angeal ate while Genesis drank his coffee and tried hard to wake up. Angeal drank whatever coffee Genesis didn't get to, and Sephiroth always had tea with two generous spoonfuls of sugar.

After Genesis finished his coffee and was properly awake, he actually joined in the breakfast conversation, which usually revolved around Angeal's mentee's latest antics, who had a crush on Sephiroth, and what a tightwad Lazard was. While the others talked and ate, Genesis played with Sephiroth's hair. Morning was the only time of day that Sephiroth was calm enough to let him do so, and Genesis took full advantage of that fact.

When breakfast ended, Genesis went back into the bathroom to do his hair and all the makeup he swore he didn't wear. Sephiroth knew he actually did. It was the only explanation for his red hair and extremely dark eyelashes. The other two dressed, and by the time Genesis exited the bathroom, all of them were in uniform and ready to leave. Sometimes, Sephiroth had early morning meetings and left before Genesis had a chance to say goodbye, but usually, they all waited around to go their separate ways.

They always said goodbye, and sometimes Genesis hugged them (not always Sephiroth though, because sometimes Sephiroth looked like he was going to kill you if you touched him). It was because they led rather dangerous lives, and there was always that lurking sense of worry that this would be the last goodbye.

Most days, they came back at night, fell asleep, and the whole routine started over again the next day at 5:30 sharp.

Until the day when Genesis never came back. Sephiroth and Angeal never would have imagined how much they missed the grumpiness and the swearing and lugging Genesis into the shower.

Mornings were never really the same.


End file.
